Russia, Glenn Beck agree: Google fomenting actual revolutions

Vladimir Putin's Russia isn't pleased with Google's role in recent Middle East …

It's no big surprise to find out that Vladimir Putin's Russia doesn't much appreciate protests against authoritarian regimes. It's more surprising to find American TV talk show host Glenn Beck saying the same thing. And gets twice as weird when both men name Google as a potent force behind the protests currently sweeping the Middle East.

Putin's Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin told the Wall Street Journal recently, "Look what they have done in Egypt, those highly placed managers of Google, what manipulations of the energy of the people took place there," referring to Google execs like Wael Ghonim of Egypt.

Beck, meanwhile, has been promoting dark theories about Google's cooperation with the US government. Last week, he told fellow Fox News host Bill O'Reilly that "there are four or five executives that are also in bed, literally—not literally—but in bed or in the office with the president and working with the White House… Google, in their own words, Google, two vice presidents of Google actually helped foment revolution in Egypt, and they're proud of it."

On his own show, Beck later recommended that his viewers not use Google. "May I recommend, if you’re doing your own homework, don’t do a Google search. Seems to me that Google is pretty deeply in bed with the government. Maybe this is explaining why Google is being kicked out of all the other countries? Are they just a shill now for the United States government? Who is [Google exec] Jared Cohen? Is he private citizen or government operative? And isn’t this the second Google guy we’ve found [after Wael Ghonim]? This is the second Google executive now being exposed as an instigator of a revolution. Are you comfortable with the government partnering covertly with media organizations, search engines, and social networking so they can bring change that the Washington elites have designed?"

Who knew that Google was such a force for popular democratic revolutions—and that this was a bad thing?

Seriously my reflexes are pretty on the market oriented, lower taxes side of the spectrum but the Free Speech provision should have an exception for Glenn Beck. Who has allowed idiots to speak on national television?

In the end I have a choice between a party that contains an awful lot of braindead idiots like Sarah Palin, with spokespersons like Glenn Beck, a party that loves to cut sensible spending like infrastructure and would never lay a hand on the real problems like Medicare and Medicaid because a huge part of their voters is older and would never vote for someone cutting those.

And a party that is ruled by lawyers, teachers and public unions which are the biggest leeches of this society and a party that has senators that love to say bullshit like the American people want us to make more rules, btw some of the lefty knee-jerk comments on msnbc and co. are almost as idiotic as Glenn Beck they just do not have such a high concentration of idioticity.

Seriously the sound you hear is Ronald Reagan rolling in his grave and Bill Clinton rolling in his bed.

^this^

I mostly watch Fox news (but not O'Riley, Hannity or Beck..) but switch to CNN regularly because in the middle of the the day it's much more...umm, well, news and besides Meghan Kelly is really easy on they eyes (even my wife says that). I read USAToday and the Orange County Register on paper, and whenever I read news on the internet, it's usually from MSNBC but sometimes I can't help but head over to NewsVine when I see stupid crap like "Rep. Giffords Tweets to her husband" when it obviously didn't happen that way, I Listen to Mark Levin on the radio but want to pull my hair out if I have to hear Hannity because he's a pretty big douche too.

I'd just like to note that the comments in this thread are pretty disheartening.

Sure the subject is outrageous and Glenn Beck does plenty to deserve ridicule, but the opinions rendered here have been mostly reactionary, shallow, hateful, and uninformed. It's fun to poke at stuff we don't understand and giggle about it, I guess.

I did like the intermittent attempts at the discussions on WI and the collective bargaining. I have heard some details about it that I haven't been able to confirm in casual news reading to much frustration. It really is a great example of sensationalist journalism in that the multiple articles and news stories and roundtables I've seen have focused on either pie-in-the-sky ideals or emotional reactions and crowds of people with signs being angry about things they have little knowledge of. I just have this horrible feeling that News is simply broken. I've noticed it intellectually for years, but it's feeling more real all the time.

I love how Beck suggests that all you need to do to overthrow dictators is have some carefully placed business assets enable domestic uprisings. So Afghanistan, Iraq, remind me what that was about, again.

If we are truly interested in democracy, as is often said, we would be happy for Egyptian people. Regardless of who your friends are, if you are against totalitarianism, you should not mince words. All I hear is how scary the Islamic Brotherhood could be. I am not positive on Islam to begin with, but if that is what their people want, what business is it of ours?

Hey, now there's a twist I hadn't seen/heard before. My understanding was that the governor would strip the government workers' rights to unionize completely, not that they would lose the privilege of striking on company time...

I disagree, however, with the notion that we can ban ban negotiating for benefits; again, it's up to the employer to stand up to outlandish demands.

The unions could still negotiate with private industry for these benefits. This would just impact government workers. It would simply not allow elected officials to promise that someone elected in the future would pay for benefits tomorrow so that they dont have to pay them today. Because that is the problem they have no one saved for the future benefits they promised in the 80's and 90's that are they are having to pay for today at priced 800% higher than they were when originally promised.

Imagine how many lives could have been saved by western nations had their governments known that to bring democracy to the world just meant having and internationally connected computer network, a search engine and a social network or two.

Finally the West can cut back on all that out of control military spending and begin to rein in those deficits. These Internet connected entities that are responsible for all this social/political upheaval are self-funding, don't require any government intervention and have proven to be much more efficient at bringing about this change.

This comment really makes me think. Are the only things you need for a democracy willing people and a way to easily organize themselves?

That's basically how the U.S. started. It wasn't just a few leaders yelling, they had people behind them willing to fight for what they wanted.

I won't say it was "easy" to assemble back then - the mode of transport being a horse or your feet - but they were able to gather in town halls, and such, and coordinate to an extent.

#1 reason why so many "democracies" fail - the people of the country don't really care enough to make it stick.

I'd just like to note that the comments in this thread are pretty disheartening.

Sure the subject is outrageous and Glenn Beck does plenty to deserve ridicule, but the opinions rendered here have been mostly reactionary, shallow, hateful, and uninformed. It's fun to poke at stuff we don't understand and giggle about it, I guess.

I did like the intermittent attempts at the discussions on WI and the collective bargaining. I have heard some details about it that I haven't been able to confirm in casual news reading to much frustration. It really is a great example of sensationalist journalism in that the multiple articles and news stories and roundtables I've seen have focused on either pie-in-the-sky ideals or emotional reactions and crowds of people with signs being angry about things they have little knowledge of. I just have this horrible feeling that News is simply broken. I've noticed it intellectually for years, but it's feeling more real all the time.

I agree with your first view of these comments, but what does Glenn Beck do to deserve ridicule? He has an opinion and presents his case as he sees it.

As to collective bargaining, this is collective bargaining between public employees. Who does the union bargain with? Elected officials. These same elected officials that may or may not get elected depending on donations from the union they must bargain with. Surely, you can see a conflict of interest in this case. Also consider that in the WI case, the collective bargaining for salaries will remain. You might ask yourself why our public education system is so bad, could it be that both sides of this "bargain" get what they want? Do you think they would get the same "bargains" with the parents or taxpayers?

How does Beck keep a straight face spewing out his conspiracy theories?

He does it because by keeping a straight face and doing what he does best, he is fast becoming the richest pundit on TV. Throw in his goldline shilling, his Apocalypse Seeds, his pushing for rich people to go buy a luxury bunker ticket, etc, together with his show and contract. And public appearances. And radio show. And books.

There's so much money in what he does that he's absolutely got NO reason at all to stop or feel silly about it. Do a clown feel silly if he's making tons of money making balloon animals? No? Then why should Beck?

This Google-Gov conspiracy is ironic coming from him. If McCain had won, he'd be saying Google had ties to terrorists. Instead, they have ties to the Democratic Executive because... well, because they don't agree with him on the small things. The important point here is that, like George Soros, he has a reason for what he's doing here.

It has nothing to do with Google having tie to the government or Google being the Terrorist Search Engine. It has everything to do with Rupert Murdoch's outright HATRED of google. Specifically, they are stealing his news and he hates them. He gave them a few years to make it right and stop pissin' on his hushpuppies, but they refused. So now he's unchained the pitbull (ie., Glenn Beck) and he's kicking at the dog pen to let all the other dogs loose at 'em.

If this sounds familiar, this is what happened with the whole George Soros thing, too. People were starting to think Rupert Murdoch and that stakeholder in News Corp that happens to be a muslim were having too much power and actually talking about it (thanks Jon Stewart), so like maaaaagic, Beck appears with a slander piece on the evil George Soros, destroyer of peace and ender of accord.

And throughout all this, I have to wonder when did Glenn Beck decide that American VALUES matter less than American INTERESTS? Would he actually say that democracy cannot be trusted anywhere but the US?

Because in my opinion we have no room to talk. Our country had an inauspicious start, us being the unwanted and unnecessary people who looked for a better future. I'm pretty sure there were a LOT of people throughout the world that did not think WE needed freedom. But we did it and now we have that freedom so he can spew his nonsense all over the airwaves all he pleases because we don't have a monarch to have him executed. (Although Bush Jr sure did like to think he had that power with his secret prisons.) So I wonder how do we get to judge what democracy other people choose for themselves? If Egypt chooses to go radical Islamic and they make it work, who are we to judge?

See, thing is, I believe in American VALUES, not American INTERESTS. I believe everyone has the right to choose for themselves. Haha, even Michael Bay got that right and that's kinda sad.

I love how Beck suggests that all you need to do to overthrow dictators is have some carefully placed business assets enable domestic uprisings. So Afghanistan, Iraq, remind me what that was about, again.

what does Glenn Beck do to deserve ridicule? He has an opinion and presents his case as he sees it.

An incredibly stupid opinion isn't worthy of ridicule? Who knew.

Quote:

As to collective bargaining, this is collective bargaining between public employees. Who does the union bargain with? Elected officials. These same elected officials that may or may not get elected depending on donations from the union they must bargain with. Surely, you can see a conflict of interest in this case.

Wow, that's some insipid cherry picking. a) politicians get dough from any number of special interests they have the power to affect but I don't see you suggesting that industry should be penalised as a whole b) the gov't is in the position to make or break unions, regardless of campaign financing and c) if a gov't body is going to partake in any sort of marketplace, instituting policies that favour them over the private sector (like, say, removing collective bargaining) is grossly irresponsible.

Quote:

You might ask yourself why our public education system is so bad, could it be that both sides of this "bargain" get what they want? Do you think they would get the same "bargains" with the parents or taxpayers?

Right, public school teachers are living it up. That's some gangsta shit, yo. Don't be messin' with Big Education. Oy vey.

I realize that what Beck is proposing about Google is rather ridiculous (though not out of the question), but it seems like this article is presented with the thought "all the readers will know Beck is full of sh** so we won't look into it in any detail". It would have been nice to see some background research done on this, but it doesn't look like there was anything more than reporting what Beck said.